In two years, the Vietnamese authorities have managed to remove 142 games from the local App Store and Google Play. All these games were declared banned in the country.
This is reported by VnExpress with reference to the Ministry of Information and Communications of Vietnam. The latter is actively working with Apple, Google and Facebook, seeking the removal of illegal games or a ban on their monetization. Many of them contain illegal content. Others were released without a license.
In Vietnam, as in China, multiplayer games are strictly regulated. It takes 20 days to check and license them. The term can be extended if there are violations in the game. The title may not be allowed on the market if it contains gambling, profanity, episodes of violence or distortion of the history of Vietnam.
If the game is also foreign, everything becomes much more complicated. A foreign publisher needs to create a local branch (with a foreign capital share of no more than 49%). Otherwise, the title will not be licensed.
The second way is to conclude a contract with a local partner who will act as the publisher of the game. The latter must store player data on regional servers and transfer it to the authorities on demand.
There were cases when a local partner agreed to transfer the income from the game to a foreign publisher without signing a contract. Such companies are prosecuted by law.
Games published in the Vietnamese market must be licensed. We do not allow international games in which there are players who earn money in Vietnam without the permission of the authorities.
These strict rules have already forced the Finnish Supercell to abandon the publication of its games in Vietnam. The studio announced “problems with the local regulator.” So Vietnamese players lost access to such popular hits as Clash of Clans, Clash Royale, etc.
We should add that 175 multiplayer games were released in Vietnam last year, 95% of them Chinese.
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